Frame construction questions

[The Bees Ankles]

I buy unassembled frames from Brushy, they're just great by the way. Recently I bought a deep box and a bunch of deep frames to go with it but I've decided I should stick with all medium equipment so I'll have to cut the excess from the box and the frame ends.

1st question: why do the frame ends taper?

2nd question: is it okay if I just shorten the frame ends and cut the ends of the bottoms off so I can butt them together with glue and nails?
       (I guess they won't be quite as strong but I'm not planning on using them in an extractor anyway because if I ever do have bees and actually harvest honey, I'll just cut out most of the comb and use the crush and strain method.)

Thanks in advance to all of you for your combined wisdom and continuing patience!

[BlueBee]

1.  The taper is there to get the frames spaced at the proper distance (35mm)
2.  Yes, you can cut the bottoms off and butt joint them together if you like. 

You have a lot of artistic freedom when it comes the frames, they don’t have to look just like a ‘standard’ frame to work.  The Mann Lake all plastic frames have a pretty long area for the spacing whereas wood frames are usually less.  I prefer less since it gives the bees less area to propolize the frames together.

Another option is to just buy some new end bars from Brushy, I believe you can buy the end bars separately if you like.  Sawing small pieces of wood can be dangerous; in some cases it is wiser just to buy new end bars. 

[The Bees Ankles]

Thanks for the answer BlueBee. I thought about just ordering the replacement parts but the shipping seemed to be about 5 times more than the parts so I thought I'd just re-do them. I'll just use hand tools, the wood is very soft and I don't have a much in the way of power tools anyway.

[G3farms]

If you are in a club, some one might be interested in trading end bars with you.

Never know til you ask!!

[Michael Bush]

>1st question: why do the frame ends taper?

so the bees can move around the end bars.

>2nd question: is it okay if I just shorten the frame ends and cut the ends of the bottoms off so I can butt them together with glue and nails?

Yes.  Here are pictures of just that:

http://bushfarms.com/beeseightframemedium.htm#cutdownframes

Click on the thumbnails for bigger pictures.

>       (I guess they won't be quite as strong but I'm not planning on using them in an extractor anyway because if I ever do have bees and actually harvest honey, I'll just cut out most of the comb and use the crush and strain method.)

They will be plenty strong and you can extract them if you ever decide to.